Lesson #6 – Not all compliments are good ones. Sometimes they are just a bit too keen.

There has recently been a break up in our house and life has been well, difficult since then. Ollie and his former friend sleep have decided to go their separate ways. I don’t feel as though this is a permanent break up, more like that time in Friends when Ross and Rachel were on a break. Well that’s what I’m hoping for anyway. As a result of this conscious uncoupling (on Ollie’s part I’m sure!) and having a husband who often works away, our house in the afternoon has been not much fun.

When Ollie was young and I had absolutely no idea what I was doing as far as this Mummy gig went (now I feel that on some days I have slightly more idea) I would freak out at the prospect of leaving the house. Wondering what the heck I would need to pack in the nappy bag and trying to time outings around feedings. It was hard work (mostly just in my own head!). Thankfully, the freak out has since subsided somewhat and for us, when things get tough, the cranky head to the local zoo and botanical gardens. Yesterday was one of those days.

When we got to the zoo I noted that there were hoards of people wandering around. This was a surprise since at 3:30pm on a Wednesday there is usually only a few mummy’s pushing prams with small people in them. Yesterday there were kids everywhere, big ones, small ones – all of them… everywhere. They were running around, yelling, screaming and banging on the windows of the enclosures. Reality then descended on my cranky and sleep deprived brain…. it’s school holidays. I was tempted to pack us back into the car and head home, but instead, decided to persevere.

Everywhere we walked around kids commented things like: “Look mummy, there’s a baby!” “LOOK! That baby has orange hair!” A few of the kids spoke to me about my “giant” baby (tell me something I don’t know – he will probably be bigger than me by the time he’s 2!) and once or twice a mum would smile at us as walked on by.

We made it down to the crocodile enclosures (my personal favourite) and saw that there were people everywhere. A kind lady made room for us to stand beside her as we all ogled the giagantor croc below, willing it to do something exciting. She looked at Ollie and told me how gorgeous he was, how he was perhaps the cutest baby she had ever set eyes on. My (completely biased) parental heart swelled with pride and I thanked her for her lovely words. I gave myself a mental pat on the back for dragging us out of the house for the outing and felt as though chatting to this lady had been a day brightener. That’s when things took a little bit of a turn for the well umm interesting.

She looked at him again and said “Does he do any modelling?” I laughed and responded that he only models for me and that I have a few pictures of him on my phone (only 3,500 or so.). At my response, she looked at me intently and said:

You should really get him into baby modelling and get him signed up with an agent.

I laughed a little and thanked her for the compliment. She looked at me with the same intent expression and explained that she was serious and that it would be well worth looking in to. At this point, it was clear that I would probably need to agree to look into the possibility before she would let up. I told her that I would think about it and again thanked her for her kind words and departed the croc enclosure to head in the general direction of the car park.

It was definitely home time. As I packed Ollie and our possessions into the car, I did let my mind wander for a second or two. Could he really be the next big ‘baby star’? Was there really such a thing? I imagined him at a photo shoot for Baby Gucci and I was there (impeccably dressed in my DVF dress) barking orders at people and adjusting his outfits like a good Momager (thanks for the term Kris Jenner) does. Then I blinked and came back to reality. It’s amazing what my exhausted mum brain can dream up.